The purpose of these parenting blogs will be to present some of the questions that I am often asked, both as a psychologist and as a parent.

Many people call or come to see me with high expectations about the kind of advice that I can provide. Many people just want the simplest tools, techniques and strategies. There are a lot of simple tricks that one can try and use, but I want to say two really important things about giving advice, or perhaps more importantly receiving advice:

1) Most of the time, we already have the knowledge of what needs to be done. Parenting is often about confidence in our abilities to manage our children's behavior. There is rarely one simple answer that works for everyone. The tools and techniques have to fit with our overall relationship styles. Actually, that is often where the answers to problems come from - our personality, our family history, our personal stories. I really believe that most of the solutions we need are actually contained within us.

2) It is important to have theoretical framework for providing advice. Theory creates structure and provides a method of understanding behavior. Having ideas about why a child behaves in a certain way can be very helpful for parents, and this knowlege itself can generate solutions. There are many different psychological theories for child development, and this is not the place to say which is better than the other. My orientation is generally a behavior management approach which itself is rooted in learning theory (i.e. how we learn and respond to the environment around us).

I look forward to hearing different ideas and approaches to some of the challenging issues that are raised, and that these blogs will be of use and interest to parents and other people with an interest in psychology.